The New York Times is reporting that police came to the house twice over the years - once in 2000 when the detained owner Ariel Castro reported a fight in the street, and again in 2004 because in his job as a school bus driver, he had inadvertently left a child on board when he parked the vehicle at a lot.

"They [police] went there to talk to him [but] children and family services, they never had a chance to speak to him. But they didn't have any criminal intent behind that, so nothing happened with that," Ms O'Neill said.

"We are hearing also reports of neighbours who say they they at one point heard pounding on the doors of the house. Another one said her daughter once saw a naked woman crawling on her hands and knees in the backyard.

"They say that police looked into this but never went inside that house, so this hasn't been confirmed by police. They're saying they have no record of this, but they will look at everything that's in the records to see if this is true."

Authorities said it would be some time before the details of the ordeal come out, as FBI agents go about the delicate task of interviewing the women.

Dramatic rescue

Ms Berry, who went missing a day before her 17th birthday, escaped with the help of a neighbour, who kicked in the door of the house in the working-class neighbourhood.

Ms DeJesus, who went missing aged 14, and Ms Knight, who was 20 at the time of her disappearance, were also rescued from the property.

The women were taken to a Cleveland hospital for medical checks, where they were reunited with their families. They have since been released.

"The nightmare is over. These three young ladies have provided us with the ultimate definition of survival and perseverance. The healing can now begin.

"As you can imagine, words can't describe the emotions being felt by all. Yes law enforcement professionals do cry."

Deputy Police Chief Ed Tomba said the women would eventually reveal what went on in the house for the past decade.

"They are going to have to tell us that," he said.

"Obviously, there was a long period of time where nobody saw them. So we have to wait until we interview them and hopefully they are going to tell us exactly what went on in there. They were the only ones there along with the suspects."

He said the women seemed to be in fairly good health, although "they needed a good meal".

"Help me! I'm Amanda Berry ... I've been kidnapped and I've been missing for 10 years and I'm here. I'm free now," Ms Berry can be heard telling a 911 operator in a recording of the call made using the neighbour's phone.

I'm totally in shock. He seems like a normal guy. He was a gentleman. We all call him Mr. C.

Woman who knew suspect Ariel Castro

Mr Ramsey said he saw a young woman "going nuts", kicking at the door and struggling to get out of the house.

"I go over there - with my Big Mac - and I say, 'What the hell's going on?'," he said.

"And she says: 'I've been kidnapped. I've been in this house a long time. I want to leave. Right now'."

Ms Berry couldn't open the door by more than a crack the size of hand, so Mr Ramsey said he kicked out the lower panel, enabling Berry to crawl out carrying a little girl.

'He was a gentleman'

A woman who lived on the same street where the women were found said Castro lived alone in the house.

She said he drove her two daughters to school and would drop them off in front of her house.

"I'm totally in shock. He seems like a normal guy. He was a gentleman. We all call him Mr C," she said.

A man who helped to look for Ms DeJesus, pastor Angel Arroyo, said he and her family members had handed out flyers in the neighbourhood where she was found.

A mood of jubilation pervaded the city as word spread that the women had been found alive, especially in the blue-collar, heavily Latino neighbourhood where dozens of residents clustered near the house from which they were rescued.

A cousin of Ms DeJesus, Sheila Figaro, told CNN that the girl's mother, Nancy, "never gave up faith knowing that her daughter would one day be found."

"What a phenomenal Mother's Day gift she gets this Mother's Day," she said.

The disappearance of Ms Knight did not attract the local media attention of the suspected abductions of Berry and DeJesus.

Her grandmother, Deborah Knight, told the Cleveland Plain Dealer newspaper that some family members had concluded, based in part on suggestions by police and social workers at the time, that she had run away.

But her mother Barbara Knight, who now lives in Florida, told the newspaper she never believed her daughter would have vanished without a trace on her own and that she kept searching long after police gave up looking for her.